The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
(NHTSA) has had a long-standing interest in improving the
safety of both younger and older drivers, and in recent
years has revitalized its interest in improving the safety of
these groups.

NHTSA's approach to dealing with the problems of
younger and older drivers proceeds on two fronts. First,
each of these age groups is addressed in dedicated research
projects that focus on physical and behavioral problems or
practices. Second, younger and older drivers are treated as
part of the continuum of the overall driver population in
research that focuses on specific safety issues. The
Agency's research and rulemaking activities focus on
underlying traits responsible for the crash experience, not
just using age per se as a discriminating variable.

NHTSA's research efforts on behalf of younger and older
drivers may also be characterized by the ultimate goals of
those efforts. The Agency conducts behavioral research to
improve safe driving actions through such avenues as
increasing knowledge and changing attitudes. It also
conducts biomechanics and human-factors research to
improve safety performance of vehicles through increased
crashworthiness and improved crash-avoidance design
features. Since vehicle improvements generally benefit
occupants of all ages, behavioral research tends to be more
focused on specific age groups than vehicle-oriented research.

The Agency's behavioral research findings are incorporated
into model safety programs and disseminated through
published guidelines or reports of demonstration programs
and program evaluations. States and communities are
encouraged to adopt these model programs and implement
them through their own legislative or program actions. The
findings of the vehicle-oriented research are implemented
through Agency rulemaking actions, which require vehicle
manufacturers to comply.

This report on NHTSA's research agenda for addressing the
safety issues of younger and older drivers was requested by
the Committee on Appropriations of the U.S. Senate in
Senate Report 102-148, which contained the following
language:

The Transportation Research Board report entitled
"Safety Research for a Changing Highway
Environment" carefully documents the challenge to
highway safety posed by both the older and younger
populations. As the report notes, the high
involvement rate of older drivers in crashes (on a
mileage-driven basis) is second only to those of
drivers under the age of 25. Although NHTSA has
important programs focused on each of these
populations, the Committee seeks to enhance these
efforts. Consequently, the Committee requests that
NHTSA submit a report detailing its research
agenda on topics specifically addressing the unique
safety issues related to the older and younger driver.

NHTSA has long been aware of the special needs of
younger and older drivers. Accordingly, the Agency
developed safety plans addressing each of these special
populations some time ago. As information accrues and
needs change, these plans are updated and revised. The
request for this report came at a time when the Agency is
extensively revising each of these plans. This section
briefly summarizes the existing planning documents.

NHTSA's existing plan for road users aged 15 through 24
describes Agency program and research activities that
address the highway safety issues prevalent among young
drivers. This plan was first published in 1990.

The purpose of the NHTSA Young Adult Highway Safety
Plan was to create an organized and focused approach to
the population most at risk on our nation's highways: the
driver under the age of 25. The Plan represented an
integrated multi-disciplinary approach to a complicated
traffic safety problem.

The young adult program was built upon a model initially
developed as part of the Agency's anti-drunk-driving
program. This model addressed the young adult highway
safety problem in the areas of enforcement, adjudication,
supervision, legislation, licensing, school-based programs,
school-based extra-curricular programs, community based
programs, and work-place based programs. These
approaches were directed at the following priority areas:
alcohol and other drugs, occupant protection, driver
licensing, and motorcycles.

The output from this approach resulted in a presentation of
(1) programs focused on a single issue; (2) comprehensive
programs focused on two or more issues; and (3) research
and development activities. This research effort is
intended to identify attitudes and behaviors characteristic
of young adults to aid us in developing increasingly
effective strategies for dealing with this population
segment.

Many of the long-term research activities described in the
Plan have been completed or have provided sufficient new
information in the area of problem identification. Some
projects described have been completed and new ones have
been initiated. The Agency is currently revising this Plan
to reflect accumulated progress and to accommodate the
findings of completed activities. The revision will be
completed during Fiscal Year 1993.

NHTSA's Traffic Safety Plan for Older Persons addresses
drivers, vehicle occupants, and pedestrians. The Agency
developed the Plan in 1988 in response to
recommendations in the Transportation Research Board's
(TRB) Special Report #218, Transportation in an Aging
Society. The Plan was developed to provide a
comprehensive, coordinated program for improving the
safety of older persons, while achieving a balance between
safety and mobility.

NHTSA's Plan responded to the TRB report's
recommendations and provided details of other work
deemed necessary to improve the safety of older persons.
It called for conducting research in problem identification,
occupant protection, driver licensing, pedestrian safety,
consumer information and vehicle safety.

NHTSA has completed many of the activities described in
the Plan and conducted additional problem-definition
activities, including co-sponsoring an international
conference on research needs of older drivers. The results
of these activities produced new knowledge about older-driver
problems that suggested improved ways of
addressing both safety and mobility issues. This research
has significantly refined the older person traffic safety
issues and provided information to older person groups in
both driving and pedestrian areas.

The Plan was designed to encourage close working
relationships with other Federal agencies, the States, and additional concerned groups. While implementing the
Plan, NHTSA has established lines of coordination across
both State and Federal government agencies and private-sector
groups. These connections have stimulated and
guided research activities by other organizations well
beyond the level that this Agency would be able to support.

The 1988 Plan for older persons is undergoing a major
revision, and is scheduled to be completed during Fiscal
Year 1993.

The foundation of all traffic safety research is a thorough
analysis of relevant data to identify problem areas and
define populations needing special attention. The
appropriateness and effectiveness of countermeasure
development rests on this foundation. This section
summarizes the Agency's findings regarding the level of
crash involvement of younger and older drivers, and
characteristics of the crashes that differentiate between the
two age groups. Additionally, this section presents
information on differences in performance abilities that
distinguish the two groups.

Figures 1 and 2 show, respectively, the number of drivers
and the distance that they travel by age group. The similar
shape of these two curves shows that the mileage traveled
by each age group is closely related to the number of
drivers in the age group. In 1990 there were slightly more than 26 million licensed drivers, ages 15 through 24, and
about 22 million licensed drivers, 65 years of age or older.
Although younger drivers only slightly outnumber older
drivers (16 percent to 13 percent of the population of
licensed drivers, respectively), the younger group drove
more than twice as many miles as the older group.

Figures 3 and 4 show, respectively, the number of drivers
in reported crashes and the number of fatalities resulting
from those crashes. The shapes of these two curves are
also nearly parallel, showing that the relationship between
crashes and fatalities is roughly the same for all but the older drivers. Younger drivers were involved in four times as many reported crashes as the
older group. They also were involved in three times as
many fatal crashes as older drivers. Compared with older
drivers, more than twice as many younger drivers died.

Figure 5 shows that after the number of crashes is adjusted
for the number of licensed drivers in the age group,
younger drivers are considerably more likely to be
involved in a crash than are older drivers. In fact, the per-person
crash involvement rate decreases as age increases
until drivers reach 85 or more years of age. Even this age
group has a per-driver crash rate lower than drivers
younger than 50 years of age.

While the per-person rates reflect a smaller proportion of
older drivers involved in crashes than younger drivers,
adjusting the number of crashes by the total mileage
traveled by members of each age group reveals a different
pattern. Figure 6 shows the number of crashes
per 100-million miles traveled. This curve indicates that
the highest per-mile crash rates occur among the youngest
and the oldest age groups. This demonstrates that an
"average mile" driven by a member of one of these two
groups is more dangerous than an "average mile" driven by
a member of an intermediate age group.

However, since drivers at either end of the age range drive
far fewer miles than those in between, researchers have
questioned the equality of those "average miles" across age
groups. Unlike younger and older drivers, drivers in the
intermediate age groups travel a sizeable proportion of
their annual miles on expressways and other inter-city
roadways. These types of roads typically offer fewer
hazards than do roads in urban areas. Most of the miles
driven by younger and older drivers involve congested
areas and heavy concentrations of intersections that offer
relatively more opportunities for conflict with pedestrians
and other vehicles.

Fatality rates reveal that older drivers are at increased risk
of dying, whether the rate is based on the number of
licensed drivers (shown in Figure 7) or on the total vehicle
miles traveled (shown in Figure 8).

If drivers of any age were equally likely to die from crash
injuries, then the shape of Figure 7 should be the same as
Figure 5. This condition appears to hold for drivers below
the age of 60 or so. However, drivers older than 60 years
of age show increasing fatality rates, indicating that older
drivers suffer more serious injuries in crashes than do
younger drivers. This increase in driver fragility with age
is shown more clearly by plotting the rate of fatalities per
crash by age, as in Figure 9.

On a per-mile basis, older drivers have a greater fatality
rate than other-aged drivers. But by any other measure,
younger drivers outnumber, out-travel, out-crash, and out-die
older drivers. However, once they are in a crash, older
drivers are more than three times as likely to die than are
younger drivers.

By looking at the relative proportions of involvement in
different types of crashes, it is possible to gain some
understanding of the differences and similarities between
age groups, independent of the absolute levels of
involvement. Analysis of police crash reports contained in
NHTSA's 5-State Crash Avoidance Research Data File
(CARDFILE) reveals some striking differences and some
surprising similarities between the crash patterns of
younger and older drivers.

Time of Day

Figure 10 shows the hour-by-hour pattern of crashes by
drivers of different ages. The younger-driver crash pattern
does not differ much from that of drivers between the ages
of 25 and 64, showing the majority of crashes occurring
between 7:00 a.m. and 8:00 p.m., with a small peak during
the hours of morning rush hour and a large peak during
evening rush hour. After 8:00 p.m., the number of crashes
declines slowly to a minimum around 4:00 a.m. (for 25 to
64 year-old drivers) or 5:00 a.m. (for 15-24 year-old
drivers). Older drivers, on the other hand, have few
crashes between 8:00 p.m. and 7:00 a.m. The crash patterns of older drivers do not show rush-hour peaks, but rather a slow increase in number from 7:00 a.m. to about 11:00 a.m., remaining flat until about 4:00 p.m., and slowly
decreasing until around 8:00 p.m.

The relationship between crashes and lighting parallel the
patterns of crashes by time of day. Well over half of all
crashes occur during daylight hours. However, the relative
proportions of daylight and dark crashes vary with age, as
shown in Figure 11. The 15 to 24 age group has one in
three (33 percent) of their crashes after dark. Drivers
between 25 and 64 have one in four (25 percent) crashes
after dark. Drivers between 65 and 74 have one in eight
(12.5 percent) of their crashes after dark, and the oldest
group (75 years of age or older) has one in twelve (8.3
percent) crashes after dark. These results follow the
reported driving habits of older drivers: they tend to drive
less and less after dark as they get older. Many do not
drive after dark at all.

Remarkably, the distribution of crash severity is almost
identical across age groups, as shown in Figure 12. About
60 percent of all crashes involve property damage only; 22
to 23 percent involve possible injury; 12 percent non-incapacitating
injury; 5 percent incapacitating injury; and
fewer than one percent of crashes involve fatal injury.
Among the fatal-injury crashes, the level of involvement
increases with age, with 0.6 percent for drivers 15 to 64;
0.7 percent for drivers 65 to 74; and 0.9 percent for drivers
75 and older.

The majority of crashes involve two vehicles, regardless of
drivers' age, as shown in Figure 13. Among younger
drivers, two-vehicle crashes account for 68 percent of all
crashes, compared with 71 percent of drivers 25 to 64, and 80 percent of drivers 65 and older. The percentage-point
differences between age groups on two-vehicle
crashes are largely made up in single-vehicle crashes.
Proportions of single-vehicle crashes from the youngest to
the oldest are 21 percent, 16 percent, and 10 percent,
respectively.

Most crashes for all age groups occur at intersections,
although the proportions are somewhat different for the
different groups, as shown in Figure 14. About 50 percent
of crashes of the youngest and middle groups occur at
intersections, whereas about 60 percent of older drivers'
crashes occur at intersections. Younger drivers show a
greater tendency than other age groups to be involved in
non-intersection crashes, with 15-24 age group showing 43
percent, the 25-64 group showing 41 percent, and the 65-74
group showing 31 percent.

More than half of the crashes of all age groups involve the
vehicle going straight just prior to the crash, accounting for
59 percent of the youngest group's crashes, 57 percent of
the middle group's crashes, and 53 percent of the oldest
group's crashes. These proportions are shown in Figure 15.
The most striking difference between the groups is in the proportion of crashes involving left turning. While 11
percent of younger drivers' crashes involved left-turning,
17 percent of older drivers' crashes involved left-turning.
Within the older driver group, the oldest drivers show the
greatest proportion of crashes in this category, involving 16
percent of 65-74 year-old drivers' crashes and 21 percent of
the crashes of drivers 75 years old or more.

Excessive speed is the primary error in 15 percent of
younger-driver crashes, but only in about 5 percent of
older-driver crashes, as shown in Figure 16. Right-of-way
violations are the primary error in 18 percent of older-driver
crashes, but only in about 9 percent of younger-driver
crashes. Older drivers also make more errors at
signed or signalized intersections than do younger drivers:
14 percent and 9 percent respectively. Driver inattention,
which includes falling asleep at the wheel, was about
equally likely among younger and older drivers, accounting
for slightly more than 5 percent of crashes in each group.

Blood Alcohol Concentrations (BAC) at or above .10
percent are detected in about 6.5 percent of crash-involved
younger drivers. Drivers between 25 and 64 years of age
also show BACs at or above .10 percent in 6.5 percent of
their crashes. Older drivers, however, show BACs at or
above .10 percent in less than 2 percent of their crashes.
These relationships are shown in Figure 17.

Alcohol plays a much larger role in fatal crashes. One out
of 10 fatal crashes in 1990 involved drivers or pedestrians
with BACs between .01 and .09 percent, while 4 of 10
involved drivers or pedestrians with BACs at or above .10
percent. Twenty-seven percent of young drivers in fatal
crashes had BACs at or above .10 percent, compared with
26 percent of drivers between 25 and 64, and 6 percent of
drivers 65 years old or older.

The primary problems of drivers between 15 and 25 years
of age appear to be related to lack of experience, immature
judgment, and risk taking. Younger drivers have limited
life experience to rely upon in developing responses to the
driving environment.

Some researchers contend that younger persons, especially
in the teen years, have a sense of immortality and
invulnerability to danger that carries over into their driving
behaviors. Younger drivers tend to believe that crashes
only happen to others. Some younger individuals also tend
to display other characteristics that foster unsafe driving.
Younger drivers perceive risk differently than older drivers.
A NHTSA study found that younger drivers rated speeding
as less dangerous than did their more experienced
counterparts. There also was evidence that young drivers
saw themselves as more skillful than their peers, and that
young drivers' increased familiarity with a driving location
reduced their perception of danger in that situation. This
was not found for more experienced drivers. The findings
suggested that, relative to drivers over 25 years of age,
young drivers associated lower risks with certain driving
acts and underestimated their personal risk of being
involved in a crash. .

Personality factors, particularly among males, may also
contribute to the young driver problem. The literature
includes references to over-expression of impulsiveness,
daredevil driving, anger in traffic situations, and driving to
let off steam after arguments. There also are weak but
consistent correlations between various "anti-social"
personality traits (more common among the young than
other age groups) and higher crash rates.

The research literature confirms conventional knowledge
about the effects of aging on cognitive, perceptual, and
motor abilities.

Age-related changes in vision make it more difficult for
older adults to accommodate to darkness, recognize objects
under low lighting conditions, recover from glare, and
search their environment. Virtually all behavior slows with
age, with performance decrements being more pronounced
as task complexity and cognitive demands increase.
Making decisions becomes more difficult, as does
changing a course of action once a commitment has been
made. Memory deteriorates with age, although the decline
in healthy adults is not as great as previously believed.
Short-term memory, in particular, is affected by aging.
While few studies linked cognitive declines specifically to
driving abilities, it is clear that these kinds of changes in
abilities could pose problems for drivers who experience
them.

Experience and judgment are qualities that can contribute
to compensating for slowed responses and sensory
deficiencies. Evidence shows that most older drivers are
aware of their changing abilities and adapt accordingly:
making shorter trips totaling far fewer miles, and driving
substantially less at night, in heavy traffic, and in bad
weather. These self-regulated changes in exposure to risk
largely account for the differences in crash characteristics
between younger and older drivers.

Driving problems increase with the seriousness of certain
medical conditions. To the extent that older individuals are
aware of their conditions, they tend to limit their driving
appropriately. But, if they are victims of conditions of
which they cannot be aware, they appear not to limit their
driving and are consequently exposed to greater crash risk.
Cognitive disorders, such as Alzheimer's Disease and
difficulties performing tasks that require processing of
several sources of information are among the most serious
of these latter conditions.

Older drivers' safety problems are exacerbated by
increasing frailty. Drivers 75 years old or older are three
times as likely to die in a crash than are 20 year old drivers.